


Metal Grimm: Rising

by SuperSecretAgentQrow



Category: Metal Gear, RWBY
Genre: Alternate Universe - MG Rising, Cyborgs, metal gear rising
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-23
Updated: 2018-02-23
Packaged: 2019-03-23 02:13:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13777518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SuperSecretAgentQrow/pseuds/SuperSecretAgentQrow
Summary: Called for duty just as Oscar had finished her repairs. Why couldn't the Metal Grimm wait untilafterher movie before murdering everyone?





	Metal Grimm: Rising

**Author's Note:**

> A one-shot for now.

“This is Beacon Command to Ruby Rose.”

Only the constant whir of Bullhead rotors answered.

“Beacon Command to Operative Rose!”

Muffled snickers and giggles could be heard over the turbulence.

“Dammit, Ruby! Stop being such a child and answer the fucking intercom!”

“Operative Ruby Rose to Beacon Command,” answered a sing-song voice. “The person you are looking for is not available. Please leave a message so she can reply at a later juncture~”

“Rrrgh.” The seething frustration heard over the phone was palpable. “I swear, Miss Rose, only you could be joking on a course directly into a warzone. How _very_ predictable.”

The lady in question laughed out loud, unable to contain herself. “Oh cheer up, Weissy! There’s nothing like getting back in the action after a month away!”

How could anyone be so infantile in a life and death situation?

Another audible growl before her friend sighed. “Alright, fine, Ruby, welcome back to the active hunter crew, how was your vacation, **buddy**? Lots of well-earned rest, hmm?”

Ruby cringed. She’d spent most of her twenty-two days essentially under house arrest laying on a table as Oscar worked routinely to mend the half of her body that wasn’t sinking into the North Vale Sea. “You could say that...”

The victorious 'hmph' Weiss gave earned an eye roll. “Alright, then, seeing as you’re obviously out of shape, why don’t I give you the official mission spiel again?”

Ruby groaned and rattled her bench, nearly shaking off the high-caliber sniper she’d been servicing before the (un)expected call. “Weiss-queen, _noo_ , please don’t -”

“Hush, you. As of 05:30 Standard Vale Time, Beacon Defense Consulting received a client hotline alert from city-state Amity Plains, priority tier **annihilation**. Cause of concern, EMP-F emitter found destroyed along with militia contingent dead on-site. The city is on the border of the West Vale Reclaimed Territories and immediately succumbed to total Metal Grimm onslaught. Beacon Operations official shield failure parameters are clear and contain, followed by escort for the on-call repair team.” Weiss continued even though Ruby was whistling a superhero tune, evidently bored and having already read the briefing. “Complicating the matter is the parallel contract Amity Plains has signed to a smaller PMC,  Brawnz and Partners Paramilitary, who are currently defending the town center with the repair crew. Your revised mission is to dispatch any Metal Grimm attacking Amity Plaza and moving on alone to clear the emitter site while the BPP escort the mechanics to your location. Are there any questions?”

Ruby rolled her eyes again (Oum bless the mighty Weissy) and raised her hand, though alone in the back of a transport heliplane. “Wouldn’t it just be easier if I grabbed the crew myself and brought them to the emitter?”

“Ugh, utter dolt, you _clearly_ haven’t been following changes in PMC law during your time away. Under the New Mantle Conference guidelines, different paramilitary groups operating in a localized area, without explicitly opposing missions, are to have distinct and non-overlapping directives from their clients and are to never acknowledge the other. This wouldn’t have been a problem,” Weiss muttered, “if it wasn’t for that **fiasco** in Vacuo Central District proper.”

“I read about that one!” Ruby chipped in. “The two PMCs who were on opposing sides of a Mistrali conflict ran into each other and caused hundreds of deaths in the city center. Which kinda sucks, I was a big fan of SSF’s incendiary ammo for Rose here,” she added, patting the gorgeous death dealer.

“Would be a PR catastrophe if our top ranking sniper was found using bullets from a mostly-blacklisted company. Anyways, drop point ETA is two minutes. Let’s go through the routine, Ruby.”

Said soldier unhooked from the exoskeleton maintenance rig and walked to the center of the transport bay. “Whatever you say, partner. Do your thingy-thing.”

As Ruby held her arms out the bay lit up and the veins of her armor came to life, all while Ice Princess tapped away from HQ. “Mission designation Toothed Rooster, Annihilation-tier assault and secure class operation. Single operative equipped with Pine 0320-Reaper subtype biosynthetic armor. Operative Rose,” Weiss continued as Ruby’s mask latched into place, “as no one else at Beacon Command is currently on duty I will act as your operation handler. Armament and vitals check.”

Ruby flexed her new right leg; Oscar had done some fine tuning and it almost felt like she was walking on air. “Armed and Ready. Sucks that you’re still on that internal Atlas clock, doesn’t it?”

As her HUD came to life a small screen at the top right appeared with a very caffeinated Weiss tapping away on a keyboard. “I was just about to go out for a run, too! That’s what I get for making a resolution this year...”

Ruby giggled. “I can be extra fast if you ask nicelyyy.”

Weiss shook her fogging head. “No matter. Better to avoid another international incident than try and shave a few minutes off the mission. Drop point approach imminent.”

The excited soldier stepped up to the circular hatch in the manner she’d grown so familiar with, locked steel boots whirring against iron limbs. “You know, with you here it’s as if I’ve got an angry Weiss on my shoulder. Almost feels like old times.”

Another elegant snort. “Please, Ruby, don’t make me laugh. I can’t tell if I’d rather go back to military school or find some way to kill my younger self for putting up with you.”

On the ship an angry red light swooned with the bells whistling all around. “Drop T minus ten seconds. Stand by for mark. Seven, six, five -“

“Just so you know,” Ruby cut in, “If I don’t hear you it’s because I found a new album to listen to in the air~”

“RUBY ROSE DON’T YOU DARE -“

“Sorry Weissy! Can’t hear you against these neat beats!”

And with glorious head-banging drums accompanied by screeching hysterics in the background, the floor opened wide and Ruby was swallowed into the sky.

_Yep. Just like old times._

Man, being airborne wasn’t something she thought she’d miss so much. Freefall with a 40-pound rifle and a state-of-the-art HF blade, Ruby timed her deceleration bursts with the thump of the bass, following the trails of smoke that were visible miles in the sky. With Weiss still waving her arms dramatically in the corner of her eye Ruby zoomed onto the beleaguered town below.

 **Beleaguered** didn’t cut it. Whole city blocks had been flattened in the mere hour since Amity Plains had called Beacon. Barricades meant to divert the machines were easily trampled over and the militia clearly had their hands full. _Imagine the chaos on the ground,_ thought the human bomb.

She was about to find out, she suddenly realized, lost in the guitar riff and without any idea where to land. Pausing the song (right through ‘this life is mine,’ too), she shouted against the supersonic wind. “Weiss! I can’t see Amity center!”

Weiss, who had given up on trying to scream at the brat, simply crossed her arms and huffed haughtily. Uh-oh.

“Weiss, c’mon, this isn’t the time for games, I need it on my HUD now!”

Who could be so petty in a life and death situation?

Not as frigid as her namesake would suggest, Weiss simply flipped a middle finger before pressing a key that immediately immersed Ruby’s mask in a holographic layover of the city-state. Meaningless facts about the founder and reviews of quality cafés flitted down the screen as Ruby scanned desperately, mere hundreds of meters in the air. How hard would it be to -

City center! Middle of the city, Rubes! Good fucking deduction there! She’d bash her own skull if she wasn’t under several g’s at the moment. Tilting her head up to the plaza Ruby adjusted the neural-assisted flight path about 30 degrees.

The airborne hunter saw Weiss grinning on the screen as every burst of air punched into Ruby like a five ton truck. “Gloat _ow_ while you _urgh_ still can - **shit-** ”

“Zip it, you’re approaching ground. I’d come up with a landing strategy if I were you.”

 _Landing strategy._ Right. Struggling against the intermittent spurts of kickback she unhooked Crescent from her back, the weight of the hooked sword even more negligible in the air. Now directly overhead the plaza, she scanned through the mass of obscured gargantuan silhouettes and accompanying militia fire. Narrowing her eyes she picked out a particularly larger shape among the chaos.

One swing. Two swing. On the third swing of her sword the huntress cut through the haze and stabbed into titanium flesh. An earth-shattering roar was cut short as the nimble warrior swung with her blade on a path straight across its throat, sending both her and the severed skull back into the air.

Landing back on solid ground with a crouch, Ruby sifted through the pack of feral machines who had paused from their tearing apart of the Amity Plains defenders to find out what had wiped out their alpha. _Beowolf, nevermore, ursa,_ Ruby listed the variants that snarled and prowled around her. The headless corpse she’d already been acquainted with, now clearly an ex-Ursa Major, fell with a crash, which distracted the beasts from the small woman who’d come out of nowhere.

It was an opening she would take, she thought grimly as she lunged forward.

In a split second six bodies were cut clean in two, a symphony of sparks flaring as she twisted into a seventh and kicked off a beowolf chest to perch onto a nearby rooftop. In a flash Crescent switched for Rose, the red-rimmed rifle giving the surprised nevermores brand new face piercings.

“I’m calculating a path for you to reach the center,” Weiss clipped among return fire from the combat creatures. “Obviously going straight through the pack isn’t very efficient. You’ll have to go down Vermillion Avenue about three clicks to reach the emitter tower.”

Dispatching the beowolves who’d tried climbing to her position Ruby followed the neon red road paved on her screen. Three more rapid fire shots from her hidden pistol pumped into a swooping nevermore before she dove off the roof. She turned back to wink at the chasing robots as six grenades ripped into their ranks. “Next time tell me where to go **earlier** , Weissy, so I don’t have to waste my toys.”

“I’m not even going to dignify that with a response. Your left.”

An instant somersault dodged over the rusting paw that pierced through what was once a beautiful pavillion. Mid-air Crescent flashed and another large bear-like head careened into the ground. “Thanks. Now where’s the freakin tower? I have an afternoon release of that new Vav Comics movie to go to later...”

“If you had the presence of mind to check your surroundings, Operative Rose, maybe you wouldn’t be so reliant on your handler, would you?”

“Hey, Ice Schnee, who said anything about -” A ping on her screen appeared and Weiss pointed a single middle finger upward. “...oh. Don’t gotta give an attitude about it...”

“Ruby, just get to the damn tower already.”

With a half-hearted salute, Ruby wound up and pounced four stories at once. EMP emitters all came from everyone’s favorite Atlas company, and Schnee Corp recommended very detailed tower specifications for optimal coverage. Height relative to urban dimensions, power use based on Metal Grimm regional activity, manned staff and guard patrol hours -

 _Oh._ No one had told her what had happened here. Ruby activated her helmet lamp as she stepped over gouged corpses of the Amity militia, sniper in hand as she scanned the top floor of the EMP-F facility. Crouching low next to what used to be a young woman Ruby rolled her over to inspect the fatal wounds, all too aware of the savagery just outside. 

Bullet holes. Two straight through her skull. The only expected kind of injuries for indoor combat. Which was unlike all the other guards, who were all missing limbs or large swaths of body mass, leaking into a shared pool of ooze on the floor.

“Are you seeing this, Weiss? This one’s got low caliber round impact marks, from some sort of pistol, but the others...”

Weiss was quiet as she analyzed the feed from the operative. “I’ve never seen anything like it,” she breathed. “It’s like if some tiny beowolf was let loose inside the room, and **didn’t** try to tear the place apart after killing everyone.”

Ruby glanced back to the shattered double doors at the other end of the hall. “Might not have been so small,” she muttered. “What were BPP’s contract parameters in the city-state?”

Weiss tutted. “That sort of information is undoubtedly confidential and encrypted.” A pause. “Got it. They had an eight-month agreement with the Amity Plains security office to patrol the wilds within a two-mile radius of the city perimeter and train new militia recruits for them.”

“Anything that would suggest the deal had gone sour, or they’d turn their backs on the people of Amity and let _this_ happen?”

“Unlikely. Brawnz himself, though raised in Vacuo, was born to a lowly East Vale family right after the Great War. Less is clear about other members of his primary strike team, BRNZ, but there doesn’t seem to be any immediate conflict of interest. Some media outlets even suggested a renewal of the contract for another year.”

“Fat chance of the city staying with the small fries now,” Miss Rose sighed. She stood up, holding Crescent in one hand and her pistol in the other, approaching the heavy barricade that hung off its hinges.

When she rounded into the emitter room she almost fired from the sheer distortion of the normally-immaculate bunker. The walls were seared with white streaks that burned through their metal skin, the generator itself a deformed shell of its former self.

Not just deformed, Ruby realized as she touched the cool solidified steel. “This is weird, Weiss. Normally if a mercenary team was hired to sabotage an EMP emitter they’d just steal the power cells, or maybe destroy the circuitry. But this...”

“The metal is warped,” her partner finished from the webcam. “Almost like it was superheated until failure. There was one case in Atlas a decade ago where a grenade went off accidentally in an emitter bunker, and even then the device wasn’t catastrophically damaged to this extent.”

A thunderous collapse interrupted them from nearby. “This isn’t the time to speculate, Ruby. The Grimm are still running rampant and we **need** to get the repair crew up here to see what they can do. Get to the roof and clear a path to the west; if the BPP team is on time you should see them en route to your position.”

Ruby nodded, and with one more glance to the once-hellish chamber she dashed over and up. Rounds upon rounds of machine gun fire could be heard back where Ruby came from, and the sooner she could get the repair team up here the fewer people would die.

With a quick mental command the HUD flared again, scanning in multiple directions as she slowly turned, looking for any sign of the repair escort. Leave it to amateurs to put you in this mess, she thought ruefully.

The screen flared green and zoomed. A lock-on. Rose was immediately aimed down a Grimm-infested boulevard to find -

“Oum Almighty, you’ve gotta be **kidding** me.”

The repair crew was down there, all right. Six men and women pinned down under a swarm of nevermores accompanied by a militia detachment being torn apart by beowolves. But where were the BPP?

They were on the ground too, actually. Mostly in pieces. Even in the early morning dusk Ruby’s scope trained on the purple-haired soldier whose limbs had been torn asunder, then the smashed corpses of two other cyborgs. Brawnz himself was a ways off to the side, legless and struggling to pump bullets into the blanket of war machines.

“Dammit!” Weiss said for her. “The mercenary team is down! So much for the BPP motto _All the Brainz and Brawnz_ , alright.”

Ruby had already picked off three of the larger avian Grimm, whose bodies smashed into the building above the defenders. “Weiss, they’re not gonna last long against that! I have to go in!”

“That’s a negative, Ruby! Did you not hear what I told you? Under no circumstances are you to abandon the tower and - are you already on the ground? Ruby, damn you!”

The operative abandoned a cheeky reply to dash into the fray, spiraling through a now-dead pack of wolfbots, Crescent whirling into a storm of red like roses as she cut through to the last member of the BPP.

Brawnz, who may have cut a dashing figure if he wasn’t gashed beyond all hope, barely acknowledged her presence as his automatic rifle continued to fire into the swarm above. Looking over him it was clear he was going into shock, the claws attached to his wrist rattling as loudly as the machine gun. From her waist Ruby pulled out an adrenaline shot and aimed it at his neck, winding back before a rifle butt slammed into her chin, knocking her aside as Brawnz resumed firing.

“Are you stupid? You’re about to fucking **die,** moron!” Ruby seethed, scrambling to retrieve the needle she’d let go of. Said soldier turned and she froze, seeing the calm rage in his one good eye.

“No time -rrgh - for me. Do your...job, R-Red Reaper...” the dying soldier spit.

Breath catching at her old moniker, Ruby’s gaze hardened before she nodded and cut into the chaos once more.

The look on the militia captain as she appeared from where there had been a diving nevermore was priceless. Deflecting the razor feathers raining down on them, Ruby sized up the civilian squad.

Half a dozen unarmed VIPs and ten wounded unenhanced soldiers. _Great._

In a quick remission from the deathstorm Ruby motioned for them to follow. “Form a circle around the escorts! Spray fire at the beowolves and they’ll be hesitant to charge us. Move!”

Despite her rallying speech the civvies balked. What else would you expect when you asked them to essentially walk into the Metal Grimm?

Burying her face in her palm, she changed strategies as the nearest soldier came face to face with the blood-red blade. “Would you rather I cut you down right here? Your home dies without us. We **need** to move.”

Whether from their renewed sense of civic duty or realizing they were totally fucked either way the soldiers packed together with the engineers and slowly the group stepped forward, bullets flying and enemies swarming around them. Emptying a clip into one of the nevermores above Ruby grabbed the now-silent machine gun from lifeless hands and continued leading the charge as bullet after bullet punched into her.

“Ruby, simply acting like a one man army doesn’t neglect the fact that your armor is untested!” Weiss admonished against the battle. “You can’t keep tanking damage for these guys for much longer!”

“Shut up, Weiss, I’m fully aware of my own mortality, thank you very much.” As she loaded another magazine the leftmost soldier fell over, arms bloody stumps as he wailed on the ground. “And that of the unlucky fucks around me.”

Luckily enough for them, most of the Grimm had followed the main militia contingent rather than theirs, and slowly as more and more bullets found their marks their ranks thinned. Beowolves who’d seemed inexhaustible were down to a dozen, with only two nevermores left as air support. Tempted as she was to run in and finish them off, Ruby knew the very human bodies behind her wouldn’t last very long without her skinny ass as an armored meat shield. As Brawnz’s gun ran dry she resorted to deflecting as much fire with Crescent as she could muster, only a little tired of the hundred damage notifications threatening to overwhelm her helmet. Weiss minimized what she could which was nice.

Another machine crumpled under well-trained fire and the tower appeared behind it. _Yes!_ Only a few meters to go before -

“Ruby!”

Another deafening crash and suddenly the beowolves were all wiped out in an instant. 

Underneath the weight of a friendly-looking Ursa Major. Fucking **typical**.

There was no way the others would survive the missile barrage the bear-like tank was rearing up for. She would have to jump in and meet the explosives herself. Just when she’d gotten used to her new model, too...Sorry Oscar. Ignoring the terrified cries of the militiamen Ruby crouched low, ready to give her HUD a new blossom of damage alerts. Hell yeah, she was ready to be...

_Red..._

__

__

_Like..._

Really? Another earthquake inducing boom came out of nowhere and the Ursa evaporated.

But the new Ursa Lord Ruby had been fully expecting to barge in never appeared.

As more explosions began to pound into the city Ruby chanced to look up, finding massive gunships instead of the murderous robo-ravens that’d been there a minute ago. Salvo after salvo hurled into the invader machines, and Ruby let out a quieter sigh of relief than the overjoyed escort members.

“Vale Coalition Military,” Weiss muttered as the dawning sky burned brighter than daylight with artillery fire. “Always arriving a few hours after the carnage has peaked.”

“Well, I can’t complain, Weissy,” Ruby yawned as she dropped down against rubble. “Almost had to give Oscar another chance to rebuild me. How is the rest of Amity doing?”

Since the fighting in their block was mostly done Weiss just displayed the map on Ruby’s HUD, multiple locations changing to yellow from calamity red. “Already the Grimm are sustaining heavy losses. Despite what the media claim the machines have some sense of self-preservation, and once they recognize the full scale of our reinforcements they’ll retreat. It’s what they were built to do, anyways.”

The cyborg swatted away the nervous medic who tried to tend to her injuries, instead pinching into her carbon-woven bicep and tearing out a barbed bullet. “Feh. I’m pretty sure the Metal Grimm weren’t built to terrorize humanity for all eternity, but here we are.”

“Indeed,” Weiss conceded, “but without the hierarchy they were built under, these machines are doomed to killing and dying by the laws even we didn’t make for them.”

“What laws didn’t humans come up with?” Ruby hissed, popping out another bullet.

“Survival of the fittest. Tyranny of the strongest. _Rules of nature._ ”

Ruby rolled her eyes but her witty retort was interrupted by the hum of nearby heliblades. A transport had detached from the nearest cruiser and descended into what remained of their street, armed Vale marines scanning for long-gone threats.

Ruby yawned again at the questioning looks from the people standing around her. “The wounded can wait around here with me; the VCM is definitely gonna have a medic or two come on down. You guys,” she pointed at the repair team who fiddled with their equipment, “should probably get to work now. Don’t worry, that dead Ursa isn’t going to bite you or anything.”

Waving them off she watched as they hurried around the smoldering carcass, then turning at the sound of boots hitting the pavement. Standing up she stretched lazily, already applauding herself for finishing before sunup. That movie had better be _damn_ good.

“Soldiers, countrymen,” she greeted with a flourish, “welcome to your very own private tour of Amity Plains, hosted by none other than - huh?”

In cliché movie fashion a dozen rifles were levelled at her as more soldiers fanned out to surround her. “Mercenary Ruby Rose! You are hereby under military arrest on orders of Vale Coalition command!”

Motherfu-

“Excuse me?” she screeched true to Weissian form, “I just soloed a feral pack of Metal Grimm and took a hundred bullets for the engineer crew, and you’re going to **arrest** me?!”

“Sorry, Operative Rose, but orders are orders. Lay down your weapons and there’ll be no trouble.” A familiar lilt made Ruby spin her head faster than if you’d offered her your Atlesian chocolate bar.

“ _Persephone?!_ ”

“That’s Major Arc to you, old friend. Wish we didn’t get to catch up under such deplorable circumstances.”

“Bu-but what did I do?! You know I was on a mission from Beacon, I didn’t just butt in by myself this time!”

“VCM recognizes the sovereignty of externally-contracted military personnel,” the older woman acknowledged as she cuffed Ruby to herself, “however that luxury **only** applies if said agents respect Vale and international law. You broke so many operations codes in the span of an hour, I’m almost impressed.”

“Told you,” Weiss grumbled before cutting the connection and abandoning her partner. Ruby flipped off both her and the smirking face of the Vale Marines officer in front of her.

“I swear to gods, Percy, if you make me late to this movie, I’m gonna make your boss dock your pay grade for a year...”

“Threatening official military outfits is also grounds for conviction, Rubes,” the Major replied easily. “Besides, my _boss_ is actually waiting to talk with you onboard the Uniter.”

The war-honed killer paled. “Actually, I-I take it back! Percy look, name your price, heck I’ll get Ozpin to co-sign your promotion! Cookies, fancy bullets, anything, just get me out of here!”

“You can give me whatever bribe you want,” Persephone droned as one of her flanking officers handed her a holographic screen.. “Just make sure you pass it by him first.”

Unable to hide anywhere Ruby pulled the deer in headlights approach as the hologram blinked to life.

A shock of blonde hair that looked as exasperated and vexed as the face below it appeared, and Ruby realized that metaphorical the car had already run her over and was backing up the check on the body. There was no escape this time.

“Umm...” she stalled before shrinking her shoulders, “hi, Dad?”

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you liked this long piece~  
> Kudo and komment if you liked it! Much appreciated


End file.
